ng?'

Jane let her hand fall on the sewing and regarded him anxiously.

'No, no! I'm quite sure _you_ can't do harm. Pennyloaf can get nothing
but good from having you as a friend. She likes you; she misses you
when you happen not to have seen her for a few days. I'm sorry to say
it's quite a different thing with Bob and me. We're friendly enough--as
friendly as ever--but I haven't a scrap of influence with him like you
have with his wife. It was all very well to get hold of him once, and
try to make him understand, in a half-joking way, that he wasn't
behaving as well as he might. He didn't take it amiss--just that once.
But you can't think how difficult it is for one man to begin preaching
to another. The natural thought is: Mind your own business. If I was
the parson of the parish--'

He paused, and in the same instant their eyes met. The suggestion was
irresistible; Jane began to laugh merrily.

What sweet laughter it was? How unlike the shrill discord whereby the
ordinary workgirl expresses her foolish mirth! For years Sidney
Kirkwood had been unused to utter any sound of merriment; even his
smiling was done sadly. But of late he had grown conscious of the
element of joy in Jane's character, had accustomed himself to look for
its manifestations--to observe the brightening of her eyes which
foretold a smile, the moving of her lips which suggested inward
laughter--and he knew that herein, as in many another matter, a
profound sympathy was transforming him. Sorrow such as he had suffered
will leave its mark upon the countenance long after time has done its
kindly healing, and in Sidney's case there was more than the mere
personal affliction tending to confirm his life in sadness. With the
ripening of his intellect, he saw only more and more reason to condemn
and execrate those social disorders of which his own wretched
experience was but an illustration. From the first, his friendship with
Snowdon had exercised upon him a subduing influence; the old man was
stern enough in his criticism of society, but he did not belong to the
same school as John Hewett, and the sober authority of his character
made appeal to much in Sidney that had found no satisfaction amid the
uproar of Clerkenwell Green. For all that, Kirkwood could not become
other than himself; his vehemence was moderated, but he never affected
to be at one with Snowdon in that grave enthusiasm of far-off hope
which at times made the old man's speech that of